In her first major speech since becoming president of the University of California last month, Janet Napolitano committed $15 million to three groups, including $5 million to help students in the country illegally with financial aid and counseling.

Napolitano, who joined UC on Sept. 30 after stepping down as secretary of Homeland Security, used the talk to Commonwealth Club members in San Francisco to outline her vision for the vast, $24 billion system of 10 campuses, five medical centers and three national laboratories.

Signaling priorities in research and graduate education, and promising a welcoming approach to immigrant students, Napolitano said she would use reserve funds to augment budgets for three groups: undergraduates in the country illegally, top-quality graduate students who might be enticed to come to UC, and postdoctoral students.

'Our future innovators'

Graduate students and postdocs "are our future faculty members. They are our future innovators. They are our future Nobel laureates. They merit our additional support right now," she told the crowd of several hundred that gathered at the Mark Hopkins Hotel in a ballroom at least twice the size of the group's usual space on Market Street.

The ballroom, in fact, was the very one where Napolitano had danced years earlier as a senior at Santa Clara University. "What a night we had," she said, smiling.

The support Napolitano will provide for immigrant students is "one more piece of evidence of our commitment to all Californians," she said. It may also be a move meant to dampen outrage among students who say the former Homeland Security chief has no place at the helm of the diverse public university.

Advocate for university

In her half-hour speech, Napolitano also dangled bait, promising to present "some big ideas" at next month's meeting of the Board of Regents, set for Nov. 12 to 14 at UCSF's Mission Bay campus.

"My intent is to be the best advocate possible for what this university and this state can achieve together," she said in a wide-ranging talk. Responding to questions, she also said she opposes privatizing the university, has a wait-and-see attitude toward online education, and called it unacceptable that Cal football players have the nation's worst graduation rate among similar programs.

Earlier, Napolitano visited Oakland Technical High School, where she astonished students by telling them of a longtime policy that lets low-income students who qualify for UC attend without paying tuition, which stands at $12,192. (Room and board would still apply and can approach $20,000 a year.)

"If your family makes less than $80,000 a year, you pay no tuition," she said.

"I had no idea," said Ian Pryor, 18, whose reaction echoed that of his classmates. "It changes my perspective."

Since arriving at UC, Napolitano has visited with faculty members, administrators and students at six UC campuses - Merced, Los Angeles, San Diego, Santa Cruz, Davis and Irvine - and stopped by UC's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. She has jumped into student seminars and learned about research - while attracting pockets of protesters along the way.

Her past role as top immigration cop has angered activists who blame her for the deportation of 1.4 million immigrants living in the country illegally. Student Regent Cinthia Flores cast the lone vote against her appointment on July 18.

Yet on Napolitano's second day at work, she met with immigrant students to try to ease tensions. The same group unsuccessfully petitioned UC's student government to oppose her appointment.

Picketing over deportations

At Oakland Tech, nine organizers from By Any Means Necessary, who included UC Berkeley students, picketed, saying Napolitano had unfairly deported record numbers of immigrants. Asked to respond, Napolitano denied having control over the deportations.

"I didn't have the power to stop them," she said, adding that she favors the federal Dream Act, which if enacted would make college graduates who are in the United States illegally eligible for permanent residency. She said she also created the "deferred action" law, which stops deportation of immigrants age 30 and younger who arrived in this country illegally before age 16.

But the small knot of activists were unconvinced.

"That's a lie," said David Douglass, a Cal senior protesting at Oakland Tech.

Protesters were so loud that social studies teacher Maryann Wolfe and her students came out and told them to pipe down.